Reference: Mortar (2)
Smith
Mortar.
Ge 11:3; Ex 1:14; Le 14:42,45; Isa 41:25; Eze 13:10-11,14-15; 22:28; Ne 3:14
The various compacting substances used in Oriental buildings appear to be --
1. Bitumen, as in the Babylonian structures;
2. Common mud or moistened clay;
3. A very firm cement compounded of sand, ashes and lime, in the proportions respectively of 1,2,3, well pounded, sometimes mixed and sometimes coated with oil, so as to form a surface almost impenetrable to wet or the weather. In Assyrian and also Egyptian brick buildings, stubble or straw, as hair or wool among ourselves, was added to increase the tenacity.
See Verses Found in Dictionary
and they say each one to his neighbour, 'Give help, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly:' and the brick is to them for stone, and the bitumen hath been to them for mortar.
and make their lives bitter in hard service, in clay, and in brick, and in every kind of service in the field; all their service in which they have served is with rigour.
and they have taken other stones, and brought them in unto the place of the stones, and other clay he taketh and hath daubed the house.
And he hath broken down the house, its stones, and its wood, and all the clay of the house, and he hath brought them forth unto the outside of the city, unto an unclean place.
And the dung-gate hath Malchijah son of Rechab, head of the district of Beth-Haccerem, strengthened; he doth built it, and set up its doors, its locks, and its bars.
I have stirred up one from the north, And he cometh, From the rising of the sun he calleth in My name, And he cometh in on prefects as on clay, And as a potter treadeth down mire.
Because, even because, they did cause My people to err, Saying, Peace! and there is no peace, And that one is building a wall, And lo, they are daubing it with chalk. Say to those daubing with chalk -- It falleth, There hath been an overflowing shower, And ye, O hailstones, do fall, And a tempestuous wind doth rend,
And I have broken down the wall that ye daubed with chalk, And have caused it to come unto the earth, And revealed hath been its foundation, And it hath fallen, And ye have been consumed in its midst, And ye have known that I am Jehovah. And I have completed My wrath on the wall, And on those daubing it with chalk, And I say to you: The wall is not, And those daubing it are not;
And its prophets have daubed for them with chalk, Seeing a vain thing, and divining for them a lie, Saying, 'Thus said the Lord Jehovah:' And Jehovah hath not spoken.